You’ve heard of virtual staging, but what is it and how can it help you sell your property? We look at how virtually staging your home or property to help you determine if it’s right for you.

What is Virtual Staging?

Virtual staging is a cost-effective alternative to traditional home staging that uses physical furniture and accessories. Gone are the days of touring home after home, sight unseen with a real estate agent. Nowadays homebuyers are combing through thousands of listings looking at the property online before ever scheduling a visit to see the home in person.

Who is it for?

Virtual staging can be used in virtually any space, but it’s primarily used in commercial and residential real estate. Commercial properties use it to help interested buyers, lessees, tenants, etc. envision how the office could look fully furnished with office equipment. And residential sellers will use it for

How do I do it?

Several companies offer their services and even freelance designers who access to the right tools to get it done right. You simply provide the pictures (ideally taken by a professional photographer), tell them what you’re looking for, and then sit back and wait.

Once you have your “virtually staged” photos make sure it clearly states somewhere on the photo it’s a virtually staged. It’s also a great idea to compare the current and modified side by side.

Pros:

Virtual staging is much more affordable than hiring a professional staging company.It is much more affordable than traditional staging, which can cost thousands per month. You also don’t have to have people comein and out of your home moving furniture, risking damage and tracking dirt along the way.

Virtual staging gives properties that curb appeal that empty properties or properties with a family’s furniture still lying around. Both of which can be a turn-off for buyers.

It can be used to inspire some home decoration ideas what the home could look like with a remodeled and updated kitchen, bathroom etc. Some people specifically seek out fixer-uppers and virtual staging can really help bring some inspiration to the space. In fact, a study lead by Hausera found that “eight in 10 American homeowners have renovated a kitchen, bathroom or laundry room in the last two years.” Thistells us that unless the home has already been remodeled recently, virtual staging can be used to bring enough inspiration that it gets buyers interested. That’s something traditional staging cannot do.

Cons:

It’s not as good as having physical furniture present when prospective buyers come and visit the home in person. And that’s the biggest advantage that physical home staging has over virtual.

Virtual staging can in some cases mislead people about the property.And in some cases, you can run into legal trouble with failure to disclose or misrepresentation. That’s why it’s very important to disclose any staged or edited images in your listing.

Finally, virtual staging can deter buyers if it’s done poorly. If the proportions are off, or it’s just done poorly.

Summary

Virtual Staging is a great investment that can go a long way when listing your property and it should be considered by anyone listing property. It’s more cost-effective than traditional staging and can make a positive impression to interested buyers.

Author Bio:

Emily works for Biproxi, an end-to-end commercial real estate listing platform that connects buyers and sellers and is committed to providing the best tools, data, and applications to empower brokers to sell intelligently, and buyers to invest confidently.